The first video was an animation in space of two astronauts wandering around, communicating and driving around in a space station. The sounds used to fit the application work really well. I enjoyed the communication element, instead of using speech they used distorted bit-crushed sounds to showcase the communication between the astronauts. As well as this the foley sounds of driving, walking around. worked as well, and the panning helped to create a sense of space successfully.
The second was a VR game? It made you walk around a space station and I felt the footstep sounds really gave a cold feeling of isolation that helped make the space station feel in a vacuum. The reverberation in particular worked well. As well as this the game created a pretend sequencer and the sounds were cool, space sound effects that fit the theme well. And the voice acting as well as edited to sound very much like a robot.
The last was a platform game, similar to things I used to play on a website called Newsgrounds. I really liked the aesthetic drawing style they used. Once the button was pressed this amazing LO-FI sort of hip hop music started playing which fit the game really well. The aesthetic of the art is similar to the musical style and it really has impressed me.
The essay begins by speaking on the spirit of place. How places need certain characteristics to bring artists and tourists to locations. And why we find these places beautiful or picturesque isn’t really easy to pinpoint. And how modernism has changed our cities and society to only associate places such as natural landmarks or remarkable built forms as beautiful locations.
It also speaks about the sense of place and how that relates to the spirit of a place, how a sense of place comes from numerous things. Sight, smell taste, touch, memories, experiences. And also the geographical environment, the local materials used in the buildings situate the sense of place in the area. And modernism has ruined this, the idea to replace everything old with something new, using cement and steel. Things that you have no idea where they came from can ruin a sense of place. Postmodernity has dismissed this approach and celebrates diversity.
It also speaks on that in a virtual environment one can create anything, any building beyond the limits of real life. Planning permission, neighbours. Population increases are out of the book and the creator becomes like a god in this situation. Also what virtual reality offers is different to other media, paintings are only experienced with sight, and digital media, imagination and sight. And virtual worlds encompass predominantly all of the senses.
It also speaks that virtual reality is definitely real if some people choose it to be. The spaces of real-life can be replicated to the utmost reality. How do we deal with this? What places can we recreate or imagine and design in the world? What should we design and what shouldn’t we?
It touches that virtual reality environments can never be authentic as authentic means to be real and that’s something virtual reality could never be, as well as this it speaks on that what they can be, is accurate reproductions of real places.
Finally, it ends with the thoughts around a sense of place in a virtual environment, how this will come from the participants in the world. The players the millions of people that connect online will create and add a living feeling to these virtual worlds.
We had our group tutorial with Ingrid and present our work. I showed the music I and Will have been working on alongside my electromagnetic recordings. As well as this Jingya showed the sound effects she has been making and editing to video. We discussed the process of working with the MA students how we have chosen our roles. Using each other’s strengths to maximise usefulness. I also spoke on how Will is currently on tour which has made it difficult to create the musical assets for the game. Will is the only member in the group that has musical abilities so we’ve been a bit setback by this. Will is extremely talented and when he returns I’m sure we will be able to quickly complete the musical components. Ingrid also spoke on making sure we have work ready to present for Wednesday and to make sure we receive a copy from the MA students. As well as to understand that because our group were slow with the development that when we have the next meeting we will have more things to create sound for than they assume. Examples transition sound effects. She also spoke to think about sound in its difference to picture, that game students often think very much more about the visuals and how sound can help those, but to as well think about what sound can do beyond replicating sounds for what’s being shown. A great piece of advice there for us as currently, that’s all we’re doing so we are very much waiting on the interface and art to be in the game to finish the product.
I rented out a small electromagnetic microphone to record some sounds for the robot game we are working on currently. I was attempting to think of sounds that would suit the aesthetic of the artwork presented and the theme of the game. I thought that electronic sounds recorded with this microphone pickup is perfect for these sorts of sounds and I went around the house exploring the electromagnetic space within.
I recorded numerous applicants around the house and a few sounded amazing. I recorded myself turning the washing machine on and off and the sound is made with a modulated pitch going up and down is perfect for this game. As well as other sounds that fit in perfectly. I’m going now to edit and add reverberation for the game and create a few stock sounds for the MA students to use in their game and to receive feedback on.
Lindsay is an award-winning British composer combining traditional practices with experimental techniques. She utilises her skills as a performer and her experience with music technology to create visceral, emotional and enigmatic scores for all genres of visual media. She recently scored the feature documentary Adventures of Joan Collins; the independent drama Things Unsaid; and the HBO/BBC documentary The Mystery of D.B. Cooper with Tim Atack. Her music for Mudlarks starring Mirren Mack (Sex Education) was recently nominated for Best Score at the British Short Film Awards. Her advertising work includes the British Airways ‘Take Off to the People and Places You Love’ campaign, Rightmove’s ‘The Renter’ and Hewlett Packard’s ‘Orchestra’, winning Bronze at the 2021 LIA Awards. She is currently working on a television drama series set to be broadcast next year; an upcoming documentary for the BBC; and her next EP of original material.
Mudlarks
I watched the tease for Mudlarks as I couldn’t find a link for it anywhere to watch the whole thing. The music used in this short trailer I assume is Lindsay’s work. It’s very haunting and I find it suits the theme of the film very well which is dark. drones enter towards the end as the clip gets darker themed. A song which began peaceful ends in a chaotic noise enhanced piece. I enjoy this work.
British Airways Advertising Campaign
I felt it was interesting to see a visiting practitioner that is in the commercial field of sound design and scoring. I felt I wanted to listen to her production work and analyse or see what she does differently to her more artistic film work. Short but sweet this piece was a remix of the song British Airways uses usually in their adverts and other video clips. I found she did a great job on this and it’s nice to see other artists doing side hustles.
Post Lecture Reflection
Lindsay grew up playing the viola in an orchestra, singing in bands. Playing bass as a kid and a teenager. She studied music technology as her undergraduate. She then went on to do an MA for film and tv. Graduated in 2017 and started working as an assistant for other composers. The misery of DB Cooper, mudlarks and lines are things she’s recently composed.
From assisting she’s gone on to music editing. She’s always been working as a composer or trying to get into that. Doing short films, documentaries etc.
She worked on a feature documentary, Mystery of D.B. Cooper. A feature-length documentary she worked on. Directed by John Dower. The documentary was about the obsessions on the crime, not who D.B. Cooper was but around the culture of this obsession of the crime, rather than being a detective and figuring out what happened. The story was told with archival clips and reenactments of characters of first-person testimonials. A few people were interviewed, the flight crew, the people who thought they knew who actually did it. It has an overarching 1970s vibe, The director wanted quirky Fargo to the score. Some 1970s music, some modern. Most of the scores were written in the box. With sample libraries, alongside Logic Pro X.
She started the score with stereotypical of 70s stuff, wah wah guitar. Heist movie-style music with flute and more, as well as modern score. When creating a score she starts with mapping out points in the footage she wanted to mark. Example shot of the plane. The rest of the queue she just follows the points she wants to hit, which will enhance the story on.
She also decided to put a key change, which is a well-known technique. You repeat the same material but a minor third higher than the previous key to create a sense of urgency to show that something different is happening without creating something new in the compostion.
One of the characters in this documentary Jerry Thomas was specifically interesting to her compositionally as he didn’t have any interest in the real identity of DB Cooper. He believed that he had died and never survived the crash from falling out of a plane. And the music was directly different to the other characters because of this. She originally created a slower tune with more going on. She then shows us version two, which is more plucked and playful. The director didn’t want you to feel sorry for Jerry but to understand the isolation he has and the director wanted it to feel more isolating instead of quirky.
She says she uses video sync instead of importing sounds into her logic project. She doesn’t use templates to create her scores, she prefers starting from blank and building up as she goes along. She really enjoys the one or two day process of finding all the sounds she wants to use. And think of interesting or creative sounds that fit characters. So she creates things and ideas as she goes along.
She used the flute to highlight points in the doc when D.B. Cooper came in. Harking to that 70s vibe in a different way. Sounds you can reuse, and sounds to use as themes as well, so if she uses a certain synth for one character she wouldn’t use it for another.
When the re-recording mixer, mixes the project. She delivers their mix of the song, and then submits groups of stems for the mixing engineer. She also likes to ask for an AIF file from the editor as she can see what they’ve done on the audio.
Mudlarks is the next project. Two girls who are homeless and living on the side of the Thames, and have a tent underneath a bridge. They work in shifts to protect the tent and go out and work to find money to survive. One girl is mute and the other is called damsel. One doesn’t come home one night and she’s is torn between going to find her friend or protecting their home. The director and Lindsay spoke a lot on how the score should amplify their friendship and also have a sense of worry and fear, where has she gone? The girl who stayed isn’t the strong one, and you’re not shown what happens to damsel so the music is there to fill in the gaps.
The violin and guitar were the main melodic instruments. She originally wrote something folkier and a lot faster but she wanted to strip it back a bit and wanted to add more mystery, who is this girl what does she do? So the main melodic instrument alongside the piano textures and the vocal textures. Gestured ideas aswell that come in at a specific moment. She created this piano texture that felt shimmery. She also used the original demo the director had created as the imagination for what he wanted her to produce. They wanted a bedroom style vibe of the music
She then showed us her project for the song, she got a friend of hers to play the guitar parts and they used the really long introduction until the lead up where the girls are dancing to change the warmth around a new day, the friendliness that they have together. The first part is dark and mysterious and the introduction to the other girl is warmer and lighter with the music. They rely on each other to survive. She added some viola and violin and she used the original drum programming from garage band and enhanced it a little bit more. And also electric guitar to make it edgier in the chorus.
Working in film and tv in the last five years, and then the covid pandemic and she had no other jobs so she started making music, she thought she would try and see what would happen. She created a few songs and decided to make three instrumental tracks and one vocal. She found herself really enjoying it, and is palling a series of EPs in this format. Each track had a theme during the lockdown, She had her own studio, her own space whereas when she was in London she was working in her bedroom and never leaving that space. She was thinking about how an exile could be a good thing. She not in these four walls for every act.
I found Lindsays lecture really useful at showcasing the possibilities of how to acquire a job in your selected field when you graduate university. The Q&A was insightful into the process of locating an entry level job and how to navigate the process.
Since we weren’t able to have a meeting last week, the MA students sent us a PDF containing everything we asked for in order to continue making more music and sound effects. I and Will felt it was important to create a sound that continues to develop and evoke emotion or themes throughout the video game. And if they showed us what the story of the game was and what each level represented we could create that. Will had a great idea since this game is to do with creating a robot’s brain and giving them consciousness that perhaps the music should reflect that. If the music begins less complicated in the first few levels and adjusts as the robot begins to learn new things. From atonal to tonal.
We finally received information about the actual story behind the game. As they did keep changing and not deciding where they were going with it. On the PDF it says.
The player is a memory-filling company worker whose daily job is to fill the robot with false childhood memories in order to complete the robot’s cognitive behaviour. On this day, he receives an unusual, assignment from a mother whose daughter has died, and the player is asked to populate a doll robot with a digital backup of her dead daughter; the entire game is a process of the player fitting in her daughter’s digital soul into the robot’s physical body (a process of synchronisation) so that each level is a link to the completion of this digital soul cognition, corresponding to the different content of each level and this is also linked to the daughter’s preferences during her life.
Looking at this I think potentially about music and sound effects. Thinking around what I’m trying to evoke. I believe we will need the ambience sounds of a factory going on. The robot is being built so we will also need technological sounds. I will rent out an electromagnetic pickup to record some sounds like these that will work perfectly for the game. Make a few variations for building the robot. The music element I find because I can’t compose with music theory it might be difficult. But I am imagining some 80s style of music similar to what I and Will did in the first week.
Currently, for the music list, they said.
Game start, background music for game start and, game states, background music for the first level.
Again not much but at least for now, we know we need to do two songs. I do remember in last week’s meeting they spoke on how they aren’t sure how many levels they have time to implement due to time restraints so this is something we will have to workaround. Either make more and be prepared if they manage to make another level. Or create more anyway to choose and see what fits around the level and give choice to the MA students.
This was the visual references part of the PDF. It seems very dark perhaps, the bottom screen reminds me of modular synthesis modules and I’m sure what I’ve created can be used in some way. I have a few recordings that I made on the modular which I haven’t had time to edit yet but I will be now I have a visual aesthetic. Again it does help so much having references as you can listen to the music while looking at the references to see if it works.
Music References
We also asked last week for music references, despite now thinking this could be a negative thing as myself and Jingya are not musically inclined. I listened to them and I do feel a tad overwhelmed. I know they don’t want the music to the same standard and these are mere references but it does make me stressed for the music creation process. I’m not a composer and typically the music I make is experimental hip hop, which samples other things. I’m not sure about the legality of sampling for someone’s video game and clearing/licencing issues so I’m deciding to only sample or use royalty-free sounds or create my own. I do still have the idea of recording someone playing keys and my housemate with his violin. I’m not sure how realistic that is at this point. But I will still attempt to do so.
Alice Madness Returns, I listened to the album and it’s rather simple. Just plucking instruments and keys. Drone sounds and the odd sound effect. It sounds more like ambience than music but they did say after initially hearing our music that they want it simpler. I think it’s totally possible to create something like this. Reverb heavy sounds with drones. I also think it suits the theme heavily. That is if they keep the story and theme they have now.
Next was Cuphead, I’ve played this game before so I knew what I was going to be listening to. I’ve actually watched a behind scenes of the music creation process that this game took when creating it. This I feel will be incredibly hard to replicate unless I use samples but again the licence issues appear when doing so. I think this style is out of the question for me at least, perhaps Will might be able to. But this sort of music requires full bands and scoring to create. I also don’t believe this will suit the vibe of their game unless they wish to create something lighthearted which they may want to.
Lastly Rusty Lake. The playlist was filled with depressing sad, slow classical piano music. Alongside synthwave/drone sounds. Again something I believe is definitely possible. It’s not overly complicated. I want to attempt it and I do believe I haven’t given it enough of an attempt. I find myself giving up before I try as music is something I enjoy creating but doing so in a linear fashion can dishearten me before I even start. I want to try to create something like Rusty Lake and the Alice in wonderland game.
They then had a section for the art style. for the game and interface section. Again they say, retro science fiction with lovely and creepy. Interesting too how we can do both we sound? A good challenge.
They also speak that the right side of the screen where the mini-game happens will be black and white. Old school. I believe the sound effects of the electromagnetic pickups will work perfectly. To really enhance this retro vintage science fiction element. Alongside some modular sounds.
Then on the left, as they described last week there will be a doll or robot that will be built as the minigame occurs. On the left side, it will be coloured and creepy but cute as shown by the art references. I believe the music that is near Rusty Lake will fill this in. If we have feedback sounds and fuzzy tv noises for the right-hand side of the screen with mainly sound effects. Robot whirring sounds as well. Then overall music with reverb and drones for the left-hand side that also fills the right I believe it will work.
Here is some current artwork of the doll alongside some references of what they want. Cold and creepy is what they’ve written. I think reverb can add that cold feeling they want really well. Valhalla Reverb.
The game interface, alongside ideas and the first version which they showed us last week. I think the sounds will fit perfectly. Especially for the right-hand side of the tv section.
Lastly, they gave us information on only the first level which says. Langauge section, how can we incorporate language into the music and sound effects for this level? Reversed speech? Human speech distorted and reverberated as sound effects in the ambience of the game?
After last week’s meeting, we were still waiting on the PDF file to be sent including all the assets we were shown in the last meeting as well as information around levels, themes etc for the music composition.
We planned a meeting for Wednesday the second of March. Unfortunately, the MA group were busy presenting their work for their degree and haven’t found any time to meet up and continue the presentation process we were engaged with. There were tube strikes at the time and Will was on tour so far the best I believe as it would have just been me showing up. This hasn’t been a very proactive week in terms of actual production so hopefully, things can improve.
Despite not having a meeting we were sent the PDF finally which gave us more updates on what they wanted. They gave more information on the story background, music list. Visual references, and music references. I’ll be looking into it a bit more to understand and do a reflection. I’m hoping I can manage to create some sound effects for the robot creation process In the game as I’m struggling with the music part of it. Perhaps I should just attempt anyway and see what I can come up with.
Pamela Z is a composer/performer and media artist who works primarily with voice, live electronic processing, sampled sound, and video. A pioneer of live digital looping techniques, she processes her voice in real time to create dense, complex sonic layers. Her solo works combine experimental extended vocal techniques, operatic bel canto, found objects, text, digital processing, and wireless MIDI controllers that allow her to manipulate sound with physical gestures. In addition to her solo work, she has been commissioned to compose scores for dance, theatre, film, and chamber ensembles including Kronos Quartet, Eighth Blackbird, the Bang on a Can All Stars, Ethel, and San Francisco Contemporary Music Players. Her interdisciplinary performance works have been presented at venues including The Kitchen (NY), Yerba Buena Center for the Arts (SF), REDCAT (LA), and MCA (Chicago), and her installations have been presented at such exhibition spaces as the Whitney (NY), the Diözesanmuseum (Cologne), and the Krannert (IL). Pamela Z has toured extensively throughout the US, Europe, and Japan. She’s a recipient of numerous awards including the Rome Prize, United States Artists, a Robert Rauschenberg Foundation residency, the Guggenheim, the Doris Duke Artist Impact Award, Herb Alpert Award, an Ars Electronica honorable mention, and the NEA Japan/US Friendship Commission Fellowship. She holds a music degree from the University of Colorado, Boulder.
Sonic Gestures
This installation was a 360 degrees video experience with multi-channel audio. The piece uses the space as an interactive experience for the visitor. The description didn’t speak on the meaning behind this and I’m definitely impressed technically by the work presented to her. I do wish I could receive an explanation and perhaps in the lecture I will. I’m wondering how the 360 video sync was done. Did they start the video at the exact same time? This is an interesting thought into the production that does give me questions.
The audio for this was layered collaged sounds, whispers and speaking. It definitely relates well to the visuals going on. Again I find sometimes with these works that it’s challenging to understand, although I know it’s not the point. But to enjoy it for what it is, which I definitely do.
Echolocation
https://pamela-z.bandcamp.com/album/echolocation
This was a re-release of an album Pamela made in 1988. This was at a time when Pamela was playing music at a local radio station. Spanning from the Ramones to Pauline Oliveros. She then decided to create something that situated herself within what she loved listening to. She started playing around with tape and a delay pedal and this was what was created. I listened to the first song Echolocation. I found it very abstract, with the delays creating a rhythmic pattern within it. I can see why the digital delay pedal was important for her work. I also listened to Two Black Rubber Raincoats and it had similar production techniques to the first song Echolocation. The rhythmic vocals as an instrument, then with a lead vocal singing over the top. I listened to the rest and the contrast between more commercial pop 80s sounding music and the more abstract ones were great and I enjoyed In The Other World the most out of them all.
In this short interview, Pamela reveals her ideas about using her voice live. She tries to use language people recognise and then take it out of context to create new meanings. She says she enjoys looping, sampling and taking a recorded vocal she has into a different context. To make the listener perhaps at first understand what is going on, to know the word she is saying but after a short while it’s flipped out of context to create something new. She also created a 1hr radio mix in which I listened to a few songs. I can see how she situates herself within her field. I always find it interesting when I don’t necessarily understand a scene or musical genre then when revealed to more artists within that field I can gain a greater understanding of how it works.
Post Lecture Reflection
Pamela begins by speaking that she was initially a musical artist and now it’s changed towards more as a composer and sound artist. She says she is more known for her voice composition and her use of wireless midi controllers. Live processing and looping, she creates performance work that is rhythmic and abstract sometimes in nature.
Pamela begins to show an extract of her performance, She uses the theremin it seems and sings in a similar way that opera singers do. It’s very ethereal and her hands seem to be conducting the sound. The looped voices create a rhythm and then she seems to solo over them. She also is reading a book while she does her performances. As well as in another context using the sound of water and looped life into her performance. She appears to have an electronic device on her hand on the other side of her palm. That I assume controls the wireless midi modulation she speaks about. She seems to be triggering samples with her hands to imitate a typewriter.
She considers her instrument to be her voice and this is the instrument that she uses. She’s been composing since the 1980s and the tools have changed since back then. When she first started to do what she does now she used to use specific devices such as outboard rack-mountable samplers and effects units. With a mixer on the top. It was heavy and impractical.
She finally decided in 1999 to port all the functions to software. With Maxmsp she started creating patches to create a software creation of the hardware rack she created. The patch was long and complicated due to code and she had to create it all herself and she managed. Over time the technological upgrade became difficult as she had to change versions and this meant issues with Mac OS and other software to make sure everything worked together.
The way she works with voice and electronics are constantly evolving with tools and technology but has remained quite similar over the years. She works with delay since the first original performance she made. When everyone was using hardware she was amassing lots of black boxes. The analogue delay machines were different every day. The delay wouldn’t always be at the time she set. It changed a lot when using software and computers. It became more accurate and more specific.
Her pieces tend to be short, 4-5 minutes. But over the years with her theatre and compositional pieces. It made her think about making pieces over a whole performance in a more modular way. She made a piece of being a foreigner in a place you live. It involved her and two other dancers. Then she made other large scale performance works, in 2010 she made one called baggage allowance. The concept of literal and metaphorical baggage. The most ambitious work she made to that date. It included a performance and a gallery exhibition with objects and sound and an online website exhibition. It was mainly available in flash programming and this has become ancient architecture.
She then shows us an excerpt of the baggage allowance performance in New York. The music is a performance with her looping her voice. Alongside a video that plays, describing the baggage people carry in their luggage. She brings out her suitcases, to show the baggage we carry, onto the stage.
In her other installation, the first thing the audience would be confronted with when entering the gallery was an X-ray and the public would have to put their luggage through the x-ray and certain objects would appear that she coded. Either a gun, a bird, a heart. Inside their bag, it would appear to have these objects inside.
She also created a screen within the other luggage trunk. And when you opened a draw it would trigger samples and sounds as well as an image with the screen. the items within the luggage and different objects would view on the screen and then you would hear the sounds associated with the object.
Another piece was called Suitcase. It was probably her favourite although not that complex it was one that was very effective for people. Either charming or kind of creepy and she believed that it was based on the scale. A small suitcase 24 inches wide. A full-grown woman was asleep inside of it and when you walked past you could see a full-grown woman in there. There would be whispers of her voice recorded within the installation of this woman asleep and this would freak people out.
In 2007 she was commissioned for a new media gallery to create an immersive setup. In a room that was 36ft long. With ten frame locked channels. With HD screens edge to edge. 16 channels of surround audio. Something site-specific for that room. An eighteen-minute loop, of her singing and time-stretched hand claps. And a chattery section with her, not a smartphone she owned. She also made a piece called the long URL.
The piece went dormant because there wasn’t another gallery that could serve the piece in a gallery. In 2019 this was shown in two other galleries. So although her work over the years has had some presence in the visual arts. It’s not so much a shift but an expansion. But although this is broadening, in her practice the sound is always the centre point.
When she starts any of her work the first thing she does is record interviews with a number of people. She uses the interview material for inspiration for her work and to compose. Pamela then shows us an excerpt from memory trace (2012) It was an interview of people saying they can’t remember and she loops up the voices into a rhythmic piece.
She also involves herself in producing for a string quartet. She uses video as a graphic score for the string quartet. On the tv behind them. The idea was for the string quartet to continue the score despite all these distractions and interruptions. The players are sort of forced to shift their attention and multitask their way through the piece.
She has also composed scores for dance and film throughout her career. Creating numerous sound pieces for interpretive dances. Because of covid, her reality of physical pieces and installations changed, and she made more of an incentive towards studio practice. She was able to do one of which was a new record which was released last year called A Secret Code. It’s been years since she’d had a cd release. The last time was in 2004.
She wanted to do performances that were more towards the idea of a different performance when doing them online. Instead of being a shadow of what we were used to. To have a show that will use the idea of online live streaming to its advantage. Using projected videos and video feedback loops. And the intimacy that a webcam gives.
Overall I was very surprised by Pamela’s lecture. I did go in thinking it would be very Avangard and hard to wrap my head around her work, similar to a few others in the past. But I decided to take the parts I found interesting. Her use of the midi controller she has built and designed. The adaptability within her performances, and the multidisciplinary approach she has when doing her work, for others and different art fields. For example theatre and film.
It states the war is not against noise, this was against a musical genre. Using sound bombs is a paradox to silence the people who make the noise.
It relates to the idea that sonic control is a priveledge and a way of silencing minorities. With techniques such as music players, smartphones and noise cancelling headphones. These are ways of cloaking their environments to not hear the suffering of others in their view. This definitely relates back to the Ultra Red – How to Hear in Common text that speaks on listening as a group and how important that is. When using this technology how can one truly listen?
The writer speaks on the video that was shown of the police entering the favelas and taking down the party. They use specific techniques in first-person shooter games and Hollywood action films to create a sense of playfulness and skewered opinion towards the police being correct in the video. To suggest that the police are in the right when engaging with the public attending these parties. That the police are the heroes and the people attending are criminals.
The police use stun grenades which go up to 180 decibels, as I wrote in my audio paper last term this is incredibly harmful! Anything above 90db is seriously bad for hearing damage. The idea that these tools are non-lethal in my opinion is ridiculous. This also shows the ocularcentrism of our society that thinks sound bombs are non-lethal.
The sonic presence of black people in Brazil and in this specific context is considered violence and the police demand silence from their parties and their voices. This is also something the Ultra-red text touches on by saying that silence = death. In this very context, the police are killing the people maybe not literally but metaphorically they are taking away their voice. They have to remain silent or be beaten and killed.
This text demonstrates that it is easier for a sound bomb to reclaim space than for a black person to do the same.
The text begins with a quote by Toni Bambara and he speaks on the fact we might listen and hear but it’s difficult to understand what others say. Do we trust it, do we feel safe? This is a good reflection of listening attentively, I would say in contrast to hearing. Listening in itself is the act of paying attention to what is being heard. A conscious decision to understand.
1.2 speaks on the idea that a group listening action can be greater than a single person’s response to the question “what did you hear?” This I feel perhaps indicates the idea of removing one’s ego and thoughts when listening but rather to respond as a group. Non verbally or verbally. That listening as a group indicates a stature of thought that isn’t bound to one’s opinion. I feel this might relate to the last text Sonic Bodies, where it speaks on learning through sound as another way of receiving information and perhaps in this sense it is similar.
1.5 speaks on the experience of listening and sometimes silence is needed, as artists, we don’t always have to say things. To have a voice either. That with our bodies we do the talking and this is a different decision. It also speaks on that if listening and the condition of It is silence, that we can’t listen to the pain and suffering of others without being silent. That we don’t need to respond, to act in this situation is to just listen. Allow room for the person speaking or showcasing to be fully listened to.
